ADMINSTRATIVE CORE: Project Summary/Abstract The Administrative Core (AC) of the ASSIST Center (Accelerator Strategies for States to Improve System Transformations Affecting Children, Youth and Families Center) provides critical operational infrastructure for effective administration and organization of all ASSIST Center activities. Center Co-Leads Hoagwood and McKay will direct the AC, and work with an internal leadership committee (the Executive Steering Committee) and an external advisory body (National Advisory Board) to provide oversight of the Center's administrative functions, including, new in this resubmission, a strengthened training and mentoring program, and a newly- created unit dedicated to integrating stakeholder input into all facets of Center research. The AC is structured into four operational units: an Administration and Scientific Management Unit (ASMU), the Communications and Stakeholder Engagement Unit (CSEU), a Training Unit (TU), and a Pilot Research Projects Unit (PRPU), to meet the following AC aims: Aim 1. Provide operational infrastructure and scientific oversight for Center activities. The Administration and Scientific Management Unit will: (1) provide executive management over administrative and scientific activities; (2) anticipate, manage, and resolve problems or conflicts; and (3) monitor and measure Center progress. In close collaboration with the Center's internal committee (Executive Steering Committee) and external advisory body (National Advisory Board), the AC will foster synergies among its four administrative units, the Methods Core, and the research and pilot projects to chart research directions; Aim 2. Engage Center stakeholders and disseminate Center findings nationally, via the Communications and Stakeholder Engagement Unit (CSEU), which will focus on the engagement and integration of stakeholder input into research projects, and the national dissemination of Center-developed research products, via the Center's website, newsletter, policy briefs, webinars, social media channels, and via our National Advisory Board, whose broad national membership and reach can accelerate the rapid dissemination of information and create efficiencies of effort in communicating Center research; and Aim 3. Advance the development of early and mid-career investigators interested in state mental health policy and services research through the Training Unit's comprehensive training opportunities, structured mentoring program, pilot research funding, and access to a rich set of state- and national-level datasets and methodological support (via the Methods Core) to support their career development. The AC's objectives and specific aims support the research projects and pilot research projects geared toward meeting the NIMH's Strategic Research Objectives 3.3 and 4.4, as outlined in the NIMH Strategic Plan.